08 August 2016 1:08 PM

My conversation with Ken Livingstone - the night before his latest disgrace

The day after I had this on-stage conversation with Ken Livingstone, he made his infamous remarks about Hitler and Zionism. I apologise for the sound quality, but some of you might find it interesting.

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There is just too much evidence of sexual discrimination in the muslim world for it to be ignored and regarded as irrelevant"
Frank Finch

I don't think you even read what I wrote.
The question "what about Islam do you agree with?" is irrelevant.

You should not have to agree with everything or even anything that someone else does in order to support their right to believe it. Would you have to agree with the religious beliefs of Buddhists in order to defend their right to practice their religion? Hopefully not. The same goes for the Catholics and Mormons and Jews.

However, the fact that Ken Livingstone could not name something about Islam that he agreed with doesn't mean that he doesn't. He probably just doesn't know very much about it. I doubt if he has problems with the notion that we should be honest, that we should treat others with respect and kindness, that we should be charitable or that we should honor our parents.
However, as a Western liberal, I find it unlikely that he would have much notion of modest dress or sexual morality, but still, it wouldn't be impossible for him to find common ground.

And, I wasn't suggesting that Ken LIvingstone was a "moderate". My point was to contrast the difference between how a moderate thinks and how an extremist does. I don't know that much about Mr. Livingstone but on this issue he appears to be more moderate than you.

”And yet, Livingstone again managed to state he was amazed that the IRA hadn't started their terror campaign earlier due to the discrimination they'd had to endure.”

Livingstone is showing his ignorance of Irish history when he states this. The IRA existed before partition and after partition continued to wage war periodically against the British presence in Northern Ireland. The civil rights movement in Northern Ireland wanted to reform the NI state, the IRA sought to destroy the NI state. Those originally fighting discrimination against the Catholic/Nationalist population had different aims and methods to what became the Provisional IRA whom Livingstone supported.

Frank Finch wrote "....or one imagines that disciples of Islam will become increasingly "moderate" until Islam fits comfortably with the current western orthodoxies of "gender equality" and so forth."

Unfortunately, Lefties are very adept at imagining. They have to be, as they're surrounded by mountains of data, evidence and pretty much absolute proof that their socialist ideology does not work when put into practice.

There is no argument to be made that it works now or has ever worked for any significant length of time, so the conclusion has to be that socialists are not actually for socialism but are more against capitalism and would be for any other form of government but capitalism.

Similarly, Livingston is not for Islam or for Palestinians, but is against the establishment whose foundation is based on Christian morality, and is against the existence of Israel which no doubt he sees as an outpost of the West, funded by and supported by Western Zionists.

Notice how whenever he was asked to talk of what he supported about Islam, revealingly he would instead talk about what he was against in regard to western aggression or trasgression.

On the subject of the IRA, PH anticipated Livingstone's continued use of this tactic and so diffused it by conceding that the Republicans had of course also been treated poorly to put it mildly.

And yet, Livingstone again managed to state he was amazed that the IRA hadn't started their terror campaign earlier due to the discrimination they'd had to endure.

So, when it comes to Islam, just like socialism we can look at past and current examples of what happens when it dictates how a state is run, and we're surrounded by Islamic Govts in practice. No need to imagine what happens when Islam has the whip hand.

We are assured that the vast majority of Muslims are peace loving moderates, yet where such moderates are allowed to vote they rarely if ever vote for a moderate leader. The exceptions only serve to prove the rule.

PH, your question and response to Ken Livingstone made his reluctance very obvious.

Watching this brought to mind two scenes from CS Lewis' fiction. One was that of the Objective Room in "That Hideous Strength" - listening to KL was a bit like that.

The second one was where you pointed out that he was avoiding the actual question, and that was like Puddleglum (in "The Silver Chair") sticking his foot in the fire, to stamp out the intoxicating green smoke, which had been causing the heroes to succumb to the witch's lies.

I'm sure we're all very happy for Elaine and her happy marriage. Anecdotal evidence might have some merit if there is an absence of any contrary evidence. Sadly, this is not the case here.

There is just too much evidence of sexual discrimination in the muslim world for it to be ignored and regarded as irrelevant. Furthermore, there is very little room for "interpretation" or "moderation" regarding the fundamental tenets of this belief system which understands itself to be much more than a private relationship between God and a person's conscience. Is Elaine going to insist that the policies and practises of all those places such as Saudi Arabia are completely unrelated to Islam ???

To describe Ken Livingstone as "moderate" is very telling. In today's world, I suppose he might pass for some kind of "moderate". Certainly, he would willingly and happily "compromise" with anything and everything that might assist him in the deconstruction of this once United Kingdom. Do not be deceived into thinking that Mr Livingstone and his comrades are motivated by "brotherly love". They dissemble artfully but you do not have to scratch the surface very hard to find that they are driven by a hatred for this country, its history and... ultimately... its people.

Those of us who truly value moderation and tolerance are not so eager to discredit, damage and destroy the institutions, customs and culture of this country which has realised these things to a greater extent than nearly any we can find in the recorded history of our species.

I think the question how "the left can square their support for Islam with their support for feminism" is based on the false assumption that all Muslims' views on women can be easily categorized into one giant heap of the less enlightened.

My Muslim husband is far less sexist (in fact he's absolutely not sexist at all) than many Western men. In fact, I have never in my life encountered as much sexist men as I have on this blog. I'm not saying it's rampant, but it certainly exists to an extent I have never seen anywhere else.

And even if all Muslims could be lumped together in their views on women, Mr. Livingstone is right to say that he doesn't have to agree with them on every issue. That is the extremist mindset that says "you're either with me or against me". A moderate can find nuance. He can compromise. An extremist can't.

And the question "well what do you agree with about Islam" is irrelevant. We don't have to agree with their religion to support their right to practice it and to not be discriminated against unfairly. And there's no question that some discrimination is going on. How is it fair that a British woman was kicked off a plane for no other reason than because she was reading a book about Syria? It's not.

One of the key moments was Peter Hitchens asking the question "Why" or "What" Mr Livingstone supports about Islam. This is a brilliant and simple challenge for those who characterise themselves as "leftish", "progressive", "tolerant" etc.

It is straightforward. If one supports/tolerates/accepts Islam and welcomes its expansion into "the west", there are but two possibilities.

Either one willingly accepts Islam and all that it reqards as fundamental...

or one imagines that disciples of Islam will become increasingly "moderate" until Islam fits comfortably with the current western orthodoxies of "gender equality" and so forth.

Either outcome is a total disaster for one side or the other. Livingstone and his ilk are the architects of disaster... and their greatest skill is in the timeing of their absence when "all Hell breaks loose".

***PH pounts out: As Mr Skylark has reached the precise conclusions I hoped any fairminded listener would reach, I rather think I did pin him down. Short of physical force, I am not sure how much harder I could have pressed him***

As I said, you did give him two or three chances to answer your question on the use of violence to achieve political ends and you politely pointed out once that he was avoiding the question. By pinning him down I mean that maybe you could have pointed out his avoidance of questions again rather than just once, or summarised at the end the questions that you didn't think he had answered directly. Alternatively, you could have rephrased the questions he hadn't answered in order to make the avoidance clear to the audience/viewer.

I say this because the conversation had a friendly tone (which is fine) which continued throughout, and in an audience seemingly supportive of Livingstone's views, his avoidance of questions could easily be lost on the audience and some of the viewers of the video as well.

I was there that night and I came away thinking Livingstone was very shallow. His answers to Hitchens questions were repetitive and came down to his identity politics model - he addresses each group individually and they only listen to what he is saying specifically to them, so contrary stances are easily accommodated. He likes to give the impression he was for negotiating with Sinn Fein to end the violence , but he wasn't in government so he had no deal to offer them. He was at that time expressing solidarity with a particular brand of Irish nationalism - physical force republicanism. The question from the audience that really showed up his paucity of imagination was whether Britain should leave the EU or not. His short vague answer was to stay in and get reform. He did not specify what reforms, how long should the EU be given to implement any agreed reforms and what the UK would do if reforms were not forthcoming. Dismal.

An interesting conversation but one in which Livingstone tended to avoid answering some of the points you put to him directly, particularly the point you made about his unclear stance regarding the use of violence to achieve political ends. And you did give him two or three chances to answer the question. I didn't find his response in saying he and Corbyn thought it was necessary to speak to Gerry Adams and others necessary because Margaret Thatcher was refusing to do so, convincing. Although his point about the situation for Catholics in N. Ireland is true, I can't help thinking with hindsight that this was probably not uppermost in his mind and instead was more like an anti-Tory position to take rather than a desire to end the bloodshed of the time.

Neither did I find his answer to your question of how the left can square their support of Islam with their support of feminism and other issues convincing either. To say that he doesn't expect Muslims to agree with all the positions taken by the left or of the left to agree with those of all Muslim beliefs or positions is not to directly address the point you put to him. Instead, his response was very muted and quite well avoided in a non-obvious way. He's very good at avoiding questions in this sense while being able to come across as seemingly reasonable rather than extreme. But then he obviously knew from the beginning he was in an audience of sympathisers. It's a pity you didn't seem to have a chance to pin him down on his answers.
***PH pounts out: As Mr Skylark has reached the precise conclusions I hoped any fairminded listener would reach, I rather think I did pin him down. Short of physical force, I am not sure how much harder I could have pressed him***

He may have reacted similarly to Corbyn when pressed on certain points and like him become fairly aggressive and dictatorial in tone. Alternatively, he may have kept up his apparent unflappability in which he seems to have had so much practice. But then again, I get the impression that perusing him for an answer would have been cut short by the chairwoman with her thinly disguised bias and admiration for Livingstone.

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